An Engaging Topic

My husband and I were living it up in Vancouver, celebrating our wedding anniversary. We had spent the night at a guest house after indulging in a grand meal at the sort of restaurant people like us only go to once in a blue moon, and decided, for nostalgic reasons, to go for brunch at Sophie's Cosmic Cafe, a Vancouver institution, before heading home. Sophie's is chock-a-block with vintage chachkies and brightly coloured walls, and serves old-school breakfasts. V ordered an egg and sausage platter, and I ordered the French toast. We drank coffee (my half decaf Americano was actually kind of awful, but I didn't complain because the food was so good) and tucked into our meals. 

Like many restaurants, Sophie's had music playing at a good volume through the speakers. I noticed as we ate, that the playlist was vintage, like the restaurant and its contents (and some of its patrons). I hummed along to the tunes while V and I enjoyed our brunch experience, my mom's voice in my head saying "No singing at the table" silenced. A song came on that I had loved as a kid, "Don't Bring me Down" by ELO (Electric Light Orchestra). I had finished my breakfast and was sipping my bad coffee, alternating with ice water, and started singing along quietly. Suddenly, I heard a voice in the booth behind me, also singing along quietly. We both noticed each other singing at the same time and turned around to see to whom the other voice belonged. The chorus came up and we sang to each other, just a little louder,  

                    Don't bring me down

                    No, no, no, no, no

                    Ooh-ooh-hoo

                    I'll tell you once more before I get off the floor

                    Don't bring me down

People near us started staring. We didn't care. We sang the whole song together. Songs you knew when you were young tend to stay locked in your brain forever. I remembered most of the lyrics, even singing 'Don't bring me down BRUCE' instead of 'groos' as it's supposed to be, because I had never learnt the original version of the line. When the song was over we shook hands and introduced ourselves. Turns out the man I was singing with was celebrating his seventieth birthday, and sharing brunch with some good friends who had flown in for the occasion from Winnipeg. We all chatted for a bit in a jovial manner befitting a birthday celebration, and the man thanked me for singing with him - said I had made his day. He invited us to his birthday party (I'm not sure he really meant it), but we said we had to be going home.  

The experience I had at Sophie's brought to the fore some thoughts I have had lately, about how people these days engage (or don't) with the world. I grew up in a boisterous family in a small town where we knew almost everyone. Most of my siblings will still talk to anyone, anywhere. I am a bit more reserved than some of my family, but in the right moment and mood I can have great interpersonal exchanges with strangers. People often talk about how unfriendly Vancouverites are, but I have found that you often get what you give. My experience at Sophie's is a perfect example. Sure, I don't do impromptu karaoke in restaurants on a regular basis, but I tend to have friendly exchanges with people more often than not if I begin the exchange by being open and friendly towards them. I have to say, this happens more often with people who are my age or older. The pre-cellphone generations are much more used to greeting each other and initiating conversation. I find, even in my own mid-sized home city, that young people rarely make eye contact with me if I am walking down the street. It's like they are trained not to. When I do get a greeting or a smile I am pleasantly surprised. I do not want to harp on the younger generations. It's not their fault. They are a product of the society they grew up in. But, I do want to encourage them to engage more outside of their social bubble. As you get older life can often get decidedly lonelier. We are more isolated than ever before. If you don't believe me, Google the subject. There are a thousand articles proving my claim and warning of the dangers prolonged social isolation can wreak on one's mental health. 

There is a passage in a book I am reading by Ann Cleeves, the great mystery novelist, that reads: 

"When Jen got home, the kids were holed up in their rooms again. They answered when she shouted up at them, but they didn't come down. There was evidence that they'd scavenged for food. She thought that prison wouldn't be any sort of deterrent for this generation, as long as they were allowed cell phones and internet access in their cells." 

Makes you think, doesn't it? God, I hope it does.

I also have to work on reaching out more. After going through burnout a few years ago, I isolated myself to a great degree, just to get some rest. I had been an incredibly social person who tended to attract similar friends. When I think back to my 30's and 40's I was rarely alone. Now I am alone a lot of the time. I don't generally mind because I have learned to like my own company and a quieter life than before, but I know I need companionship so I make the effort to engage when I am out and about. I greet people, especially elderly people, I make small talk with sales people and servers, and I compliment young parents on their cute children if they'll let me. While I hope I am brightening their day, I am the one who benefits most. And, if I can 'make someone's day' like the man in Sophie's Cosmic Cafe, then I get an extra-big boost of serotonin. Engaging is good for me, and I will argue that it is good for you, too. 

https://youtu.be/z9nkzaOPP6g?si=K2URmgx1QohGifRE

                   

'Til next time, 

Rebecca

Will Elvis Leave the Building for Good?

When the current elderly generation expires, will Elvis Impersonators be out of a job? 

The above question occurred to a friendly acquaintance and me, pretty much at the same moment the other evening, at a 50th wedding anniversary party we attended with our respective husbands. 

I was so tired. I had been away working all week and driven home in the dark the night before - an hour plus of scanning the road for wildlife with exhausted eyes and a throbbing head. When I got home my husband reminded me about the party, which was on our schedules for the next evening. "Noooo!" or maybe some curse words escaped my mouth. I can't remember. Cancelling was not really an option for this particular event, though. I decided not to think about the party, brushed my teeth, and fell into bed, sleeping hard all night.

The next morning I woke up, still tired. I managed a half-hearted shuffle around the lake, had lunch and then, a nap. The party was back down in the valley, and was to go from 4:30 to 9:00 pm. At least it won't be a late night, I told myself. The theme for the party was the 1970's, in honour of the decade our hosts were married in, and also, we found out later, the decade in which they saw Elvis live in Las Vegas for ten bucks a ticket (and that included two drinks! said our host, enthusiastically).We had been invited to wear costumes. 

We arrived at the venue and changed into our costumes in the truck. I went for a 'Rhoda from Mary Tyler Moore' look, while my husband wore fake leather pants and a polyester satin shirt for a 'disco sleezeball' look. We had found our costumes at Value Village a couple of weeks prior. While we began to get into the spirit of the event I knew we both needed a drink. We opted for rum and cokes. We both needed the caffeine boost. 

The majority of the crowd were elderly peers of our hosts, but a small group of 50-somethings and assorted younger relatives rounded out the group. After drinks and mingling to the best of our ability (I admit to sitting down and posting photos on my phone after an hour of standing around making small talk), dinner was served. Our small table of four shared a bottle of wine and waited our turn at the buffet.

The evening's entertainment began after dinner. A local Elvis impersonator in a gold jacket entered the room and began his performance. While our table had misgivings about what to expect, none of us being Elvis fans, we soon had to admit our entertainer was a pro. He soon had the room singing along with the golden oldies, and a few couples, including the anniversary couple, got up to dance in the old way. 'Elvis' sang well and interspersed his Elvis material with some Neil Diamond. Roy Orbison, and Louis Armstrong, but it was his rendition of CCR's 'Proud Mary' that got us 50-something women on the dance floor. The alcohol and food had worked its magic and energized me briefly. A couple of spry older women were inspired to join us. The elderly folks unable to dance themselves, enjoyed watching us. We became part of the entertainment. 

After the cake, made to replicate the original two-tiered wedding cake, was served, my husband and I said our goodbyes. As we made our way through the crowd after stopping at the head table, an elderly woman grabbed my hand. "You all looked great!" she said, smiling widely. I covered her hand with both of mine, holding them for a moment, and said thank you. It made me glad to know she'd enjoyed herself so much.

The party, although I had approached it that night with a 'grin and bear it' kind of attitude, ended up being fun. I observed and appreciated how the Elvis impersonator had figured out his evolving audience needed more than the dated Elvis material (sorry, fans) to be entertained. In fact, he didn't really sound much like the original Elvis to me, just did his hair like him, danced a bit like him, and drove a pink 1970's Cadillac. He told us he was going to be performing at a big classic car show the next day. 

I also concluded I am very much in favour of parties starting early and ending at 9 pm, especially when the drive home is over an hour on a dark, curvy mountain highway. 

Generation Cell Phone

I've been thinking about how each generation of children we raise lives in a different world than the one before it, and how that affects parenting those kids. I have three kids who would be considered young Millenials and one that would be considered GenZ. I know various factors contributed to their style of upbringing, but with the rate of change being as drastic as it is in this age of rapidly advancing technologies, even in the five year gap between my third and fourth children (both being girls) I noticed a difference. This main difference was the hand held pocket personal computer and communication device known more commonly in this country as the cell phone. And, I'm not just talking about my youngest's possession of one and how that affected her life, but of my own. 

I put off having cell phones in our home as long as I possibly could. My husband was issued a flip phone for work, but the rest of us did without phones, and no one thought to ask for one because they were yet to become commonplace among their peers. We did have the family computer in the living room, and we all took our turns to do schoolwork or writing projects, play games from DVDs like Magic School Bus and I Spy, Lego Harry Potter and LOTR, watch YouTube videos, download music, and play Club Penguin when those online activities came along. Often there would be more than one kid sitting at the computer at a time, sharing their experience together. One of my kids was loaned a Game Boy in Grade Five from a friend, and when I saw how addicted he became I asked him to give it back and never borrow it again. My older daughter somehow talked us into letting her get a Nintendo DS with the digital pen thingy when she was a pre-teen, but she never seemed to become as addicted as her brother had to the Game Boy. My goal was always for my children to develop their 'real world' interests first and use the digital gadgets as a tool for relaxation and entertainment on a limited basis.

I remember waiting in the elementary school yard for my youngest. A woman asked me if I was on Facebook. I told her, ugh no, that if I wanted to communicate with people from high school I would do it the old fashioned way - I wouldn't. A couple of years later my eldest who was in high school asked if he could get a Facebook account. I told him yes, but I would get one, too, and then he would have to be my 'friend' on the site. Facebook was this scary unknown to me then, and I feared losing awareness of what my son was up to. Little did I know the only thing he would use it for was posting music videos and messaging friends about social gatherings. He was the first to leave the site a few years later, too. To him, Facebook was lame already. Not so for me, I found. To my surprise, it was actually really fun to reconnect with old school-mates, my large, scattered family, and acquaintances in this limited way. For many of us it became a way to cheer each other on from afar, and to make each other laugh. People were sharing their travels, their kids' achievements, their health struggles, and their hilarious daily foibles. I soon became rather addicted to all the daily updates, and anyone who is 'friends' with me on Facebook knows I am a regular contributor. I do know my life would be lonelier without it, especially during Covid when digital connection became so vital to many of us. I know it seems I digress. We were talking about cell phones, but social media is a huge part of their use. 

I remember the day I told my husband I couldn't put off having a cell phone any longer. My job was requiring my use of one. We went to the Koodo kiosk at the mall and signed me up. By that time, flip phones were not the norm any longer. The phone I chose had a touch screen and so, in addition to being connected to the cellular network, it hooked up to our home WiFi. My carrier was Shaw, so free WiFi was available in lots of places. Unlike with the computer, I could lie down on the couch and read articles, scroll Facebook, and message people. I'm not going to lie, that was a revelation. One by one, my three older kids got phones as well, although they were well into their late teens. When all three of my older children had moved away to attend college or university, my youngest and I thought, with her busy schedule, that she should get a basic phone, too, so we could communicate on pick-up times from her theatre rehearsals in the next town. If I remember correctly, she was thirteen when I got a new phone and she inherited my old one. Fortunately, my youngest was too busy at the time to become completely addicted to her screen, and she was very handy as a tech assistant when her dad or I couldn't figure something out on our phones. 

The other day I was remembering my youngest and I sitting in our living room when she still lived at home, both looking at our phones. I compared it to the days when she or I, or other members of our family, would sit at the computer in the living room, whatever we were doing open and available to the rest of the family, opposed to both of us isolated with our little screens in our own little worlds. Most of the time she was chatting with her friends and theatre colleagues, while I scrolled social media or read articles, or chatted with family and friends of my own, losing track of time. I wondered how this change had affected our lives in a deeper sense. I know teenagers deserve to have privacy at times, but to be honest, I think personal phones have  given them too much privacy and too much information available 24/7 to absorb - a lot of it sad and/or alarming. Of course, the difference from my own girlhood is huge. I couldn't even have a private telephone conversation in our house, the corded phone being on the wall in the very center of a small house full of up to nine people at any given time. And, TV news was limited to an hour or so a night. I also wondered how my time spent isolating myself with my phone made a difference to her life, or was it just normal to her - part of the culture of the late 2000's that she took for granted? I know there are scholars out there studying the effect of technology on our brains and we are still learning. I know I have made changes in my own consumption. I turned off the Facebook and Instagram notifications on my phone, and I have learned to recognize in myself when I have become over-saturated with information and screen time. Fortunately, I feel like I have struck a balance with the devices in my life, but it took a long time. That we expect our kids to figure this out on their own is a big ask in my opinion.

I can't help but wonder how the younger moms and dads raising Generation Alpha are doing dealing with all that the world is throwing at their families. Probably their best, as most of us have done before them, learning, failing and winning as we go. 

Until next time, 

Rebecca

Engines and Fuel

I just finished reading the short novel What Strange Paradise by Canadian journalist and author Omar El Akkad. In Chapter 20 the smuggler's apprentice Mohamed says something simply awful and cynical to the passengers on the ancient run-down fishing boat that carries them across the Mediterranean to a shore they hope will provide a better life than the war-torn places they left behind:

        "You sad, stupid people," he said. "Look what you've done to yourselves. The West you talk about doesn't exist. It's a fairy tale, a fantasy you sell yourself because the alternative is to admit that you're the least important character in your own story. You invent an entire world because your conscience demands it, you invent good people and bad people and you draw a neat line between them because your simplistic morality demands it. But the two kinds of people in this world aren't good and bad -- they're engines and fuel. Go ahead, change your country, change your name, change your accent, pull the skin right off your bones, but in their eyes they will always be engines and you will always, always be fuel."

The irony of the smuggler's apprentice spewing the above as he is facilitating the migrants' journey to the West, making money off it, no less, seems lost on him. I definitely do not pretend to know much about the Middle East's history of troubles, but the fact that the leaders of much of those lands promote a deep mistrust of the West is well-known (and in some cases well founded). Still, people flock by the thousands in leaky boats and rafts in uncertain waters, wearing poor quality pdf's, risking life and life-savings in search of what the West seems to stand for. 

I have always been interested in origin stories. I enjoy learning how people got to where they are now. If I meet someone from a foreign country I often ask what brought them to Canada. I remember one woman who is now a friend answered that question with "Amnesty International and the Catholic Church. My dad was a wanted man for speaking out against the dictator of our country". Having lived a comparatively sheltered and privileged life, I acknowledge how out of touch I can be with the true, lived struggles of people who leave everything behind, often including the graves of many loved ones killed in armed conflicts or raids, to come to a country like Canada. I have to read books like What Strange Paradise to try and internalize some of what these immigrants experience. Or, I ask my hairstylist who was a Vietnamese boat person. He, too, got on a boat with his brother and father not knowing if they would live or die on the crossing to a new land. He is proud of the life he and his family have built here, and he and his wife, like many immigrants, work very hard. He has told me more than once that Canadians don't know how good we've got it. 

When I was working at my friend's tulip festival this past April I was reminded of how much it resembles an international airport during holiday times, or perhaps the UN. Every possible skin colour, ethnicity, and accent is represented (okay, a slight exaggeration, but you get the picture) Languages flow around me like bubbling streams. I love it. This year I worked in the farm shop where we sell potted and cut flowers, souvenirs, treats and drinks. As I greeted each customer I took the opportunity to be as welcoming as possible. I made short conversation with each of them and found my smiles returned. Each customer has an origin story. Each customer has as much right to be on this earth as I do, no matter where they were born. Many of them have earned that right much more than I have by the risks they have taken and the sacrifices they have made to leave all that is familiar. I am grateful not to think like the smuggler's apprentice, dividing humans into engines and fuel, and I need to continue to work in my small way to make Canada a place that gives equal opportunity to all. 

We can all be engines and fuel for each other. 

Until next time, 

Rebecca

Where Have all the Bungalows Gone?

For the past year I have been watching an Australian cop show. I discovered it while looking up an actor from another favourite Aussie show, and gave it a try. I was hooked from the start. It is one of those shows that takes me to another place, another time, and gives me a needed escape from the current reality of pandemics, wars and invasions, and the general uncertainty of our times. The fact that this show gives me forty-five minutes of entertainment nearly every day, and that justice is almost always served with a side of humour, is not the reason I bring up the show. I'm not telling anyone they should watch it. In fact, I am sure many of my friends would find it far too quaint. I bring it up for a different reason: its architecture and set design. 

The cop show which ran from 1994 to 2006, and is comprised of a whopping five-hundred and ten episodes, is called Blue Heelers. In watching the show, which takes place in a fictional small town called Mt. Thomas situated a couple of hours from Melbourne, I noticed how modest the houses were. Most of the characters live in older, one-storey ranch style homes often with peeling paint, rusty door hinges, and the very basics in modern conveniences and decoration. Sure, there are fancier homes featured now and again in the show, but those are rare and provide contrast to help illustrate a character. Everything in the show is much more aesthetically humble than what we have become accustomed to nowadays, both in mainstream film and television and in real life, and I find that thought-provoking. 

Blue Heelers reminds me of what my hometown was like in the 1970's and 80's before people came from the cities and restored it to the mini San Francisco it was originally built to be before time, weather, changing fashions (imagine beautifully carved stone buildings modernized with a face of tin siding) and economic ups and downs had their way. The characters in the show are wary of  'yuppies from Melbourne' buying up small farms and changing the vibe, and the property values, of their community, so perhaps Mt. Thomas has since gone the way of many other charming small towns and become a haven for city folks looking for that je ne sais quoi. I don't know yet - I am only on season four of twelve. Anyway, my point is, in this age of Instagram and renovation shows we in North America have come to expect a rather heightened standard of what our houses and communities should look like, (and I believe this standard is, in some small part, to blame for the ridiculous property values in British Columbia, but that is a topic for another time). 

Don't get me wrong. I am as guilty of aesthetic snobbery as the next person, and sometimes renovations and rebuilds are necessary, but to be completely honest, I like a little dingy alleyway, slanting shed or crooked fence mixed in with all this perfection. I like a hole-in-the-wall second hand bookshop that smells of old books, the occasional grandma's house that hasn't been updated in thirty-five years, or a bar that serves good beer but mediocre food on scratched tables perched on faded carpet. There can be an undeniable honesty to places that have not yet been smoothed over and made presentable with the latest in decorative touches and architectural features. I believe it's called character, and my favourite cop show has it in spades.

Perhaps I am merely a sad romantic, but I don't care about that. I care that we are slowly but surely gentrifying the heck out of our communities and that our kids may never know the fun of dancing to a great live band in a dive bar, of drying their underwear on an old radiator in their first apartment above a pizza place, or the struggle of saving for a first home that is somehow attainable for them even without Mom and Dad giving them a 300,000 dollar down payment (true story). Humble beginnings can be good beginnings and lead to true appreciation of all we have through life.

Until next time, 

Rebecca

A Question of Marriage

Last week in my Facebook feed there appeared a handful of articles on the subject of Canadians' attitudes toward marriage. The articles stated that fifty-three percent of people surveyed believed marriage to be unnecessary, and one-sixth said they are not interested in the milestone at all. One of the major factors in people's hesitation to tie the knot was the expense and stress of having a wedding. In fact, these factors caused young people to put off marriage until their late twenties, if they planned to get married at all. Many of those surveyed believed marriage was not important even when children were in the picture. The reason for this lackluster feeling towards marriage just might have something to do with changing attitudes in this country. Couples more commonly live together before marriage and fewer people look down upon them for doing so. Shacking up is socially acceptable, which wasn't the case a generation ago. I read these articles with interest, and a bit of sadness because I, myself am married and wouldn't have it any other way. Let me explain:

My husband and I are about to celebrate our twenty-sixth wedding anniversary, so I suppose it's safe to say I believe in marriage. I definitely believe in my marriage. We were married when I was twenty- two and my husband was twenty-eight. Even back in 1992 I felt pressure from some friends and acquaintances to put off marriage. Many people looked at me strangely, like I was an idiot for marrying so young. Perhaps I was, but I did it anyway. We got married in my hometown cathedral. The ceremony was ancient, solemn and beautiful. I remember saying my vows clearly and with conviction. I did promise to have and hold from that day forward, in sickness and in health, and I have kept that promise, for the most part. Most of us who have been married for a long time would admit to a few bumps along the road. The thing is, I was young. I really was. I was immature, silly in many ways, but I knew love when it hit me. And when someone comes along who loves you despite all your faults, all your insecurities and your crazy family, and loves you enough to ask you to spend the rest of your life with them, you grab that person and you hold on for dear life. I am not saying people can't do that without getting married officially. I know lots of people do. Perhaps they are stronger than I am, more sure of life, more confident in keeping things informal. But I was not that person. I knew standing up in front of all my family and friends, not to mention a God whom I believed had brought my husband and I together in the first place, and proclaiming my love and devotion and intense friendship with my husband, was integral to my happiness. Our wedding cost us very little money, but then, we had rather curbed expectations of grandeur. As for stress, yes, it was a busy time getting ready for it, but event planning was something I did as a job at that time in my life, so I found planning a wedding came somewhat naturally. My large family and several friends took care of various aspects of the event and made my job easier. My husband was unable to join me until about two weeks before our wedding. When he arrived he filled in the gaps and everything came together. In my experience, most things worth doing involve a bit of stress.

Over our twenty-six years together, my husband and I have been a team. We added four members to that team and formed an unbreakable bond - our family - which I find a great deal of comfort and joy in. Despite a bit of an age gap, which showed in our early years, we have evened out and become great equals. At a few points in those early years I questioned our marriage. I believe every couple goes through times of questioning, or at least the prone-to-navel-gazing partner does. When I felt some discontentment or frustration (I married a bit of an A type personality workaholic) I would haul out our wedding album and remember why we said our vows and made those promises in the first place. I would look at our extremely happy faces and come back to the source of our love. Those vows gave us a benchmark from which to work. Because marriage is work. Anyone who says it should be all deep gazes and roses is a big fat liar. Mind you, those deep gazes and roses do happen from time to time, and when they do, they are like a bit of beautiful embroidery on the fabric of our lives together.

I got lucky. My husband says he's the lucky one. That's what makes us work, and keep on working for and with each other. It's easy now, after twenty-six years, and it's great.

Cheers,

Rebecca

Yes, #metoo

I would be remiss as a mother, an aunt, a sister, a daughter, and most of all a woman, if I did not somehow in this blog address a certain campaign recently on the minds of most people who roam the many halls of the internet. At first, I did not want to join my voice to the others. I have never been one for jumping on a bandwagon, and I honestly thought I owed no one my own stories, but that pesky issue of sexual harassment keeps on rearing its ugly head, even exposing the seedy underbelly of our beloved Hollywood movie mill. Harvey Weinstein, that other director I can't remember the name of, Bill Cosby, Kevin Spacey, even Dustin Hoffmann all have allegations of sexual harassment against them, with some of them accused of even worse. In an interview, actress Emma Thompson said the allegations against Weinstein were 'just the tip of the iceberg' and her words are becoming more painfully true all the time. These men have all created great art and entertainment which most of us have enjoyed some time or other. (If either Kevin Kline or Bill Pullman turns out to be a perpetrator I am going to need a steep hike up the nearest mountain followed by a very strong beverage. Not that there are any rumours at all, I just really like those guys.) The #metoo campaign hatched a few weeks ago was an emotional one for me as I am sure it was for so many others out there. Introduced by someone in response to the first allegations against Weinstein, #metoo was meant to show how widespread the problem of sexual harassment and assault is. Let's face it. It's a systemic problem and the remedy is long in coming.

Certain types of men abusing their power to use or control women is nothing new, but I suppose many of us had thought our stories were not worth mentioning up until the #metoo campaign picked up so much speed. Many of us were raised not to make a big deal out of minor sexual impositions. "Oh, that's just your uncle George being funny" when he pinched your bum, or "Oh, that's just Mick. He's harmless" when we were invited into a neighbour's tool shed and saw the walls plastered with hard core pornographic images of women. I did not have an Uncle George exactly, but I did have a neighbour like Mick. Mick also had a brother - let's call him Fred - who lived up the street. We kids were always looking to make a dollar or two. Fred asked for some help washing his windows and invited a posse of pre-teen neighbourhood girls up to his place. Five of us walked up the steep hill to Fred's one hot summer afternoon. He answered the door in a tube top, except it wasn't covering his top, it was covering his hips and was the only thing he was wearing. I just about turned around and walked out but the others went in the house so I thought I had better follow. Fred showed us the windows he wanted washed and gave us the cleaning supplies. Then he went back up to his roof to suntan in the nude. We washed the windows as quickly as possible. He invited us to stay for a drink of pop or something but I wanted out of there, so I left. I'm not sure who stayed. To this day I hope nothing worse happened to any of the other girls. Also, to this day, I wonder what possessed Fred to think it was okay to behave as he had, answering the door in such a way, leering at us and making us all so uncomfortable. What a jerk. He would be reported now.

Several years after the 'Fred' incident I was at my local club dancing the night away. I had just met a  nice guy who was visiting from the States and was enjoying myself with him and a large group of friends. Most of us danced in a group on the floor, so I was not paired with anyone when the next incident happened. I was really getting into the music and having a great time flailing about when a man, a much older man than I, came up to me and grabbed my crotch. I was so shocked I went into an immediate rage and shoved that man so hard he flew across the room and fell on the floor. I then turned, grabbed my coat (it was the Christmas holidays) and ran the seven blocks home so fast my feet barely touched the ground. The next day, the nice American boy called me. He said he and his friends had seen what had happened, followed me out of the club, jumped in their car and tried to find me, but I was long gone by then. I never reported what I would now call sexual assault, and I decided it was my liberal, energetic quality of dancing that encouraged that man to touch me. I toned down my dancing for a while after that incident so as not to lead men to think I was open for business, but fortunately I was too free-spirited to let the actions of that one complete jerk determine how I was to express myself on the dance floor. These days I tone it down merely to keep from putting my back out.

I have other, more complex stories, but I choose not to share them in this way at this time. Some things are too personal, too painful or weird to talk about, especially when I didn't feel like I 'won' the situations. Luckily, I learned from those experiences and went on to marry a true gentleman.

When I was reading all the reports of the actresses who came forward in the Weinstein case, I was relieved to know how many of them had been able to assert themselves and escape his greasy clutches. Still, their ability to escape does not somehow erase the attempts on their bodies and their dignity. Where did Weinstein and the others like him, get the idea their desires trumped the rights of their victims? Their attitude has to come from somewhere. Did it come from their own fathers? From other authority figures in their lives? From television or film? I remember watching a documentary when I was a teenager called Not a Love Story, about the world of pornography and its impact on society. The documentary was made by a woman with hidden cameras. She and her crew went inside the seediest sex shops and strip clubs to see what was going on. The filmmaker's conclusion, and it made a huge impact on me at the time, was no matter how small and innocent we think our participation is - maybe we've been to a strip club, bought a Playboy magazine - we have contributed to the incredibly lucrative machine that portrays women as objects and excuses men as users of those objects. Some may laugh it all off as 'just a little harmless fun' but I am not laughing anymore and neither are the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of women who have come forward in the #metoo campaign to share their stories and speak out against abuse, assault and harassment. And, now some young men are coming forward with stories of being used and abused by more powerful men, as in the Kevin Spacey case, and in some cases women as well.

Where will it stop?

It stops with each of us. It stops when we not make concessions for men simply because they do some great things in the world. It stops when we treat other people with less power than us with respect. It stops when we honour and completely respect each other's personal space and chosen boundaries. It stops when we not allow our own ambition to put us in potentially harmful situations. It stops when we truly listen to warnings from others with more experience than ourselves. It stops when we stand up to bullies, not counting the cost to our reputations. It stops when we dismantle the 'old boys network' and its ideas that make allowances for 'boys being boys'. It stops when we parents pay more attention to the true needs of our children, especially our daughters, and work diligently to form the attitudes of our sons. It stops when we are strong enough to see what needs stopping, and act on it.

And to rephrase that old song, "What the world needs now, is justice, sweet justice." We have all the tools to make the world safer for each other. Let's use them.

Not a Thanksgiving Post

A couple of years ago I took the required FoodSafe course for my job. It was offered twice a year at our local recreation facility and the session I took was taught by a former chef who was now semi-retired and touring around the region giving courses and teaching on call for a local university cooking program. The length of the course was, if I remember correctly, six hours long with breaks. With the aid of videos the instructor talked us through all the various chapters of the workbook. The course material was not all that challenging. Much of it was common sense, so between chapters we were treated to several tales from our Swiss-born chef-instructor's years cooking in various places around the world as well as a great deal of lecturing on healthy eating. (North America has it all wrong, did you know?) Many of us engaged in the discussions and at one point I brought up the fact that I make my own granola. Oh no! said he. You don't cook oats! That kills all the good nutrients in them! You soak oats and always eat them raw. He also lectured us on sugar consumption and how none of us needed any sugar not naturally found in fruits and other foods. I, feeling a little bit smaller with my ruined oats, carried on with the course work in between his mini-lectures, and before long, it was time for a break. Most of the students stood up and went outside. I was organizing my bag of snacks and lunch stuff when I happened to glance up and see our instructor cavalierly and within full view peeling the wrapper off none other than a Nature Valley granola bar, chock full of sugar and corn syrup, and yes, BAKED in an oven. Despite my 'shock and horror', we finished the last chapters and took our test. I passed with flying colours and achieved my certificate.

I have often wondered what kind of strange thought pattern allows a person to rage against some particular habit only to turn around (and in the chef's case blatantly) take part in it. Was it Mr. Chef's cheat day? Did he suffer from low blood sugar? Perhaps, but he knew I was staring at his granola bar and yet he offered no explanation. I was left thinking of him as a complete hypocrite.

When I was growing up one phrase I heard often was 'Do what I say, not what I do.' How I was baffled by it when I was young. Did certain people in positions of authority get a pass when it came to hypocritical actions? Perhaps we were only meant we should take the good from what people say and ignore the instances when they, themselves, go against their own direction. I suppose we are all hypocritical sometimes. Tired parents often yell at their kids to stop yelling. Most dental hygienists probably eat sugar at some point in their day (I know this to be true because my daughter worked at a dental office for three years and saw a lot of cake and hot chocolate consumed). Doctors probably don't take their own advice all of the time. Dads are famous for chastising their teenagers for being lazy while they, themselves, sit in front of the football game all afternoon and procrastinate on all the chores to be done around the house.

When celebrities and other famous people prove to be hypocrites we get angry, sometimes rightfully so. The comedian with the great family TV show ends up being a sex predator. The ultra survivor man ends up, against all appearances on his reality TV show, spending each night in a luxury hotel with heat and hot water. America's sweetheart is revealed as a drug addict. The politician campaigns on a promise and gets our votes only to backtrack once in power. And on, and on, and on.

The worst part about being on the receiving end of hypocrisy is the feeling of being robbed. We were led to believe something about a person and built up a level of trust and commitment to them and what they represented, only for that to be yanked away like a ripped off Bandaid leaving pain and even some scarring. I have reached the point where I hold new people I either meet or become interested in due to their work in the public eye with some emotional distance until they prove at least to be relatively constant. Sad, isn't it? But, perhaps safer on the heart. Maybe others do the same with me. I don't make friends as quickly as I used to.

But dammit, I still make granola every week. So there.

Mourning Robin

The growth of children is truly the marker of time passing. Last week I travelled with my four children and their dad to Vancouver Island. The occasion was the 25th wedding anniversary of my husband's employers at the lodge where we lived from December, 1997 to April, 2003. When we moved to the lodge our three older children were four and a half, three years, and thirteen months. Our youngest had not even been thought of yet, although, knowing her, she had probably been planning her entrance for years before it happened.

The last time we went to the lodge was in 2009 when the owner family celebrated the lodge's 50th anniversary of operation. Our children, the older three teenagers and youngest one eight years.

The above is how I started what was to be this week's blog post. After a wonderful family holiday and reunion with friends-of-old, I was high on a cloud of happiness, floating above the earth and its cares. I sat down to write, got a few lines in before I was interrupted. When I returned to the computer I found out that Robin Williams, a comedian, actor, and benefactor admired and loved by me and by millions, if not billions, of people had killed himself. I read the news and sat staring at the screen, shocked and tremendously saddened. As details about his death trickled in over the next few hours I learned of his absolute determination to end his life - he had left nothing to chance. That was on Monday. All week I have grappled with the news and tried hard to understand it.

After my first reaction of sadness and shock I became angry. I thought of all the Iraqi people starving on that mountaintop after being persecuted and driven there by ISIS. I thought of all the people in the world who struggle daily to access the very basic necessities of life. I thought, how does someone with all the gifts and all the priveleges, all the means to do good in the world just throw it all away? I did not blame the man himself, rather, I blamed our society for collectively losing perspective of how lucky we are and how much responsibility we have inherited to try to make the world a better place. That so many people are driven to suicide seemed, in my angry phase of grief, like a giant failure. What terrible lies of the world did people believe if killing themselves seemed the only option?

When I was finished feeling angry, I tried hard to understand the pain and the depths of despair Robin must have had to endure. I remembered a time several years ago when I experienced true depression for the first, and hopefully only, time. I was lucky in that my bout was a short one, only a couple of weeks, but the experience was something I will never forget. During the time in question, I had been trying to force myself to take a job that my instincts were telling me was wrong for me. I am a fairly sensitive person and my body has always had a way of telling me I am on the wrong track. One morning I woke up and despite a cup of coffee, which usually warms, energizes and starts my day off right, I could not seem to cheer up. I could feel myself sinking down into a state I did not recognize. I began to have severely negative thoughts about myself. I began to think if only I had been a better person the world would not be such a mess. I began to assume things about some of the people in my life - I thought they secretly despised me. I felt like a failure and could not shake off my despair for days. My husband and children were baffled by my sad demeanor and gave me what comfort they could. I wrote to my parents who advised and counselled me well, as they had always done, and eventually I began to rise out of my depression. I have never felt such relief as when I could sense that I was back to my normal, relatively cheerful state. When I described my bout with depression to a friend I said perhaps it would serve to give me a better sense of what other people deal with in their own lives, and now, years later, I think it has.

When I think of Robin Williams and the various people and friends I have known who have taken their own lives, I try hard to think of them with great love and compassion. I hope they will find peace at last, although I do believe a journey of some sort awaits their soul on the other side with comfort and joy as the ultimate destination. But, more than that, I try harder to be kinder and more understanding while I am living on this side. I make time to have a cup of tea with my daughter to talk about whatever is on her mind. I write a thank-you note to an aunt who has sent me a card or a thoughtful gift. I visit my friend who suffers from chronic depression, and I give him an extra big hug when it is time for me to leave. I try to judge less, listen more, give people the benefit of the doubt, smile at strangers, say hello to elderly people I meet when I walk downtown to do an errand, thank the checkout person for bagging my groceries. I know these small things cannot conquer someone's depression if they are already suffering from it, but perhaps sometimes I, and others, can just add enough to the positive side of the scale to keep it from tipping over completely to the negative. I have to believe this or the situation seems a bit hopeless for all of us.

The other day I was in Value Village with my family. My younger daughter came up to me, beaming and holding three movies in her hands - a copy of Shrek 2, Disney's Robin Hood, and Disney's Alladin. "Look Mom!" she said.

"Cool!" I said. Then it dawned on me. Alladin starred Robin Williams as the Genie. "Alladin," I said, "especially considering Robin Will..."

She cut me off. "I know!" she said. "Did you know he adlibbed almost all his lines? I've been wanting to see this for ages." The only copy at our local video store had been stolen, and I had given away our copy years ago.

The checkout girl exclaimed loudly when she saw the video of Alladin. Apparently, she had been looking for a copy for ages, too. While I was paying for our stuff, my daughter and son searched and found two more copies of Alladin on the shelf and moved them to where the checkout girl could see them. The checkout girl gave my daughter a high-five.

Perhaps I should follow my daughter's lead and celebrate the genius that was Robin Williams through his many roles in film and television. I remember watching Mork and Mindy when I was a child and hearing my Dad laugh. I did not always get the jokes but I loved to hear my dad laugh. Robin's role in The Fisher King revealed a sympathy for mental illness which we can understand better now. And, he was my favourite Peter Pan. He brought joy to so many people, and boosted our morale, and what he has left behind will continue to do so, but perhaps now we will look with more understanding and appreciation for what it cost him and costs others like him to keep us entertained.

Here is a small glimpse at his genius. God-speed, Mr. Williams.

Fumbling Toward Independence

In some of the older books I have read like Little Women and Anne of Green Gables, young characters of talent who did not come from a family of means would have to go without a formal education once they reached a certain age, unless some wealthy aunt chose to take them abroad to study art or died and left them a bequest, which usually happened in a moment of crisis for the main character. Before the days of student loans, the future of young people was basically determined by their situation in life and whether their parents needed them to help provide for the family by going out into the world and finding suitable work. Now, whatever our social demographic our children generally live with us until they are finished high school, and in some cases, a local college course, and university is open to anyone with decent grades and the ability to apply for a loan.

When the student loan program was introduced in Canada in 1964 it provided thousands of young people from families of modest means, like myself, the opportunity to pursue their educational dreams. Most students lived as frugally as possible in sparse accommodations using milk crates as furniture and eating tuna and peanut butter to get by until their next care package from home arrived. They found jobs in summer, which rarely paid enough to fund another complete year of education, but they saved as much as possible and supplemented their savings with another loan. When the four years or more were over, they found work in their field and began their careers, paying off their loans month by month and gradually saving up for that first car that wasn't a rusty Datsun 210 or first home which was often their last home until they retired. Student life was simple and a bit of a struggle, but it was also fun and didn't seem to carry quite the financial weight that it seems to now. Paying for one's education provided an excellent transition into adult life and its inherent responsibilities.

If the television commercials of the past decade or so are to be believed, the onus is now on parents to save for their children's post-secondary education. One such ad depicts a man running and jumping over financial obstacles. A narrator says, "At fifty I didn't think I could ever retire. I had a mortgage, a struggling business to keep afloat and kids to put through university. But with the help of (insert financial institution here) I finally did it."  Apparently, it is no longer perceived to be enough to house, clothe and feed one's children until they reach the age of majority, we are expected to provide for them beyond that in order to save them from accruing massive debts of their own. Here is where I hold up my hand and say, 'Wait a minute,' because unless I win the lottery, my kids are paying their own way through life, and I should not have to feel guilty about that.

I advised my boys to begin saving for college in Grade eleven, putting half of their income from their jobs in a savings account. After his high school graduation, my eldest son, Ian had the wonderful opportunity to spend five weeks in Europe. The invitation came quite suddenly from a friend and he decided to spend his savings to go on the trip of a lifetime. We contributed what we could afford, which wasn't much, but he appreciated us helping him with the cost of his food. The trip was a life-changing experience for him and he came home not quite sure what to do next. He very much wanted to move to the city before too long, so, taking my advice he decided to take a year off, stay home and work to save again for college. He managed to find work in a local coffee place and by the following September he only had to take out a small loan to help fund his first term. He found a part time job at a music store in the city to help with his living expenses, but then was unfortunately laid off from his job in the low season. Through friends, we found him a good temporary job, and on a trip to visit him, we treated him to supper at a favourite Italian pizza place. He informed us that he had decided not to return to the college after Christmas. He resented the idea of borrowing more money for another term of college courses he felt he was just taking for the experience of it. He told us that unless he knew exactly why he was taking courses he didn't see the point in going into more debt. The news was a bit tough for me to swallow, but his dad and I understood his reasons for his decision. He wanted to work and be free to pursue his musical ambitions in the city. He knew what college was like, believed it had provided him with a good introduction to life on his own, and could go back at some point if he knew it would benefit him in a real way. When he came home for Christmas he received a call from his former workplace, the music store. He was offered a full time job. He took the job and has since been very active and happy doing what he is doing at this stage of his life.

Our second son will be off with his prized violin to study orchestral performance at a university in Vancouver this fall. Between the scholarships and bursaries he earned in high school and all the savings he has accrued working at a local cafe during his year off, he will be able to fund his first year. After that, he will most likely have to rely on student loans. Each year it will cost him many thousands of dollars and I know he will apply for whatever scholarships become available. He will also work in the summers and save as much as possible. It will certainly not be easy. The average summer job earns a student ten to twelve dollars per hour, and they are lucky to save enough over the summers to cover their tuition and books. Living expenses in Vancouver are high and I certainly feel the pressure to help our son in any way I can.

Admittedly, sometimes I wish my husband and I could afford to put our kids through school, to give them a financial headstart, but I know such a plan is unrealistic for us and the way we have chosen to live and support each other. Furthermore, and at the risk of appearing callous, I ask why we parents keep extending the rights of our children to claim us as their source of funding when they are adults?  If we truly have the means to fund their educations, pay for their fancy weddings and give them a down payment on their first home, then perhaps we should, but if we do not, then I would argue against the belief that we should feel obligated to sacrifice our own happiness to do so. My husband I have done and are doing our best to live good quality lives with our children - putting them in sports, music and drama lessons, feeding them nutritious homemade food, spending time with them and supporting them emotionally - while putting away a little for our own retirement. I had to make my way through school and make decisions in my young adult life based on the reality of my own financial situation, so why should not my children? My husband agrees. He started working in high school to pay room and board to his single mother, worked his way up into a successful retail career and then finally went to college at the age of twenty-seven.

As parents of moderate means we will support our children in the following ways as they enter the realm of adulthood: we will deliver the occasional care package to our sons, and if they run short of money for reasons other than they have spent too much on unnecessary things, we will do our best to help them. We will attend as many of their concerts and events as we can and cheer them on unobtrusively from our seats. We will let them know it is lovely to have them home for the Christmas holidays and will cook their favourite things. We will let them live at home rent-free in the summer if they choose to come home to work and save for the next year of college or university. We will be here for them if they need to call home and talk out a problem or give us some good news. In other words, we will continue to be their mom and dad who love them.

Yes, life is hard for kids in these days of pricey educations and an uncertain job market, but it was a lot harder before social programs, student loans, and flexible course schedules came along. My kids, like many others out there, are smart, creative and full of energy. They can do this! And I'm going to let them.

The Importance of Being Earnest about Voting

British Columbia is known to the rest of the country for three things, mainly: wonderful wilderness, wacky tobacky (marijuana growing and consuming), and wacky politics. We even had a premier back in the 1950's whom everyone called Wacky Bennett and seem always to be dealing with some scandal, fiasco or nail-biting bi-election. We had yet another full-on demonstration of the wackiness of our politics this week, in that, despite polls all pointing to a majority government being formed by one party, when it came down to it, not only did the far-ahead-in-the-polls government lose the election, they even lost several seats in the legislature to candidates from the opposing party. Everyone shook their heads at the result, even the winning party themselves couldn't believe it, and the next day, every type of media available was attempting to unravel the mystery of the Bizarre Provincial Election of 2013. And we are still all talking about it, many of us in mourning for the death of our hopes for a new government to replace the present one who have, from the perspective of many, done enough damage, thank you very much.

One of the main topics of conversation around the proverbial water cooler is the percentage of the electorate who voted, or more accurately, didn't vote. Only 52% of eligible voters took the time and opportunity to mark a ballot and have their vote counted. Apparently, according to some statistics I read this week, in 1983 70% of the electorate voted and the numbers have been sliding ever since. Theories as to why this is the case abound, as well as ideas of what to do about it. I find the numbers disheartening. Here we are in a democratic country where no one has to risk their lives to vote, where women can vote, where one's local candidates will find a ride for you to the voting station, and where every effort is made to make voting easy and convenient - although one cannot, as yet, vote on a smartphone in between updating one's Facebook status  - and yet nearly half of eligible voters still refuse to exercise their democratic right to help choose their next representative in the capital, Victoria, a city celebrating all things Victorian this Victoria Day weekend.

I wonder just what it is that causes so many not to vote. Is it a feeling of disconnection? Is it a 'none of the above' response to the available candidates? Is it due to sense of helplessness in the grand scheme of things? Is it laziness? Anarchy? Anti-government sensibilities? Ignorance as to what it is our Members of the Legislative Assembly actually do in Victoria? I wish there was a way to find out why people don't vote, and a better way to engage voters. I really don't think the television commercials and endless messages via social media are doing it, not because TV and social media are not effective tools of communication, but that somehow, the parties go about promoting themselves in the wrong way. One of our parties, the Liberals, chose the attack ad route, resorting to placing a cut-out of the New Democratic Party's leader on a weather vane which moved back and forth to show his apparent 'shift with the wind' policies, and dragging out a long-forgiven forged memo from back in the mid-nineties. The New Democrats decided to run a clean campaign with no attack ads, only somewhat bland commercials showing nicely dressed, smiling folks planting flowers and hiking in the forest with their children and saying, "I'm ready for a change in government," without really pinpointing what that change would look like, specifically. As for the other parties, The Conservatives and The Green Party, along with several independents, they apparently lacked the funds for TV and YouTube spots apart from the televised debate which many analysts say was the turning point in the election. The Green Party ended up with a seat in the Legislature for the very first time, and our Premier actually lost her seat to an NDP candidate. She will now have to convince another winning MLA to give up his or her seat so she can enter the Legislature. Her party, however, did win the election overall, with a resounding lead. Did the attack ads work? Or were people just listening too much to the polls and became apathetic about the other parties actually needing their vote? It is very hard to say, and each party's representatives have convincing arguments to support their point of view.

On election night I heard one analyst say that "this election will be studied in universities and books will be written about it." The result was certainly unexpected, but by now, we in British Columbia should expect the unexpected when it comes to our politics. The sun will go on rising and setting no matter which party is in power, but if 48% of us are not voting, we need an overhaul of the system, or societal attitudes for that matter, because the issues at stake are huge for us all. Jobs, the environment, stagnating inflation, education, rising medical costs, child poverty, increased homelessness, disenfranchised youth, funding for arts, culture and heritage (okay, maybe we don't all care about that, but I do!) - how can anyone say they are not personally affected by the decisions made by a bunch of suits in Victoria? How can anyone say their vote does not matter? If only 52% of us vote, how can an election not have some elements of a farcical comedy?

Have a lovely weekend, all! It's a nice, long one here. The above photo of the Parliament Buildings in Victoria is from The Georgia Straight publication. Looks a bit stormy, doesn't it?

Road Rage in the Alleyway

I am sometimes, okay, fairly regularly, proven wrong, especially when I make a blanket statement, a generality. The other day I was going about my business, doing my errands, and chatting with an acquaintance at her bakery. We were talking about our little town and I heard myself saying, "What I like about this town is that it is refreshingly devoid of drama." Those, my friends, were to be what Shakespeare, or somebody, called 'famous last words'.

As I left the bakery, order in hand, making my way to the after-school program I run at the church, I decided to take the little shortcut through the drive of the ambulance service building. As I turned the corner, I became witness to an episode of full-blown road rage. Two men, one in his car, the other just out of his, were shouting at each other - apparently one had tail-gated the other the full twenty minutes' drive from the city. I am not sure who initiated the shouting match, but both men were of good size and well able to cause injury to the other if the argument escalated to a physical exchange. I kept walking, wanting to be out of the way, but after about fifty yards, I turned back because the shouting had become louder and more violent and both men were now out of their cars. I saw one of them throw down his jacket like a hockey player throws down his gloves before a fight. They started posturing and circling like inexperienced boxers in a ring - or gorillas fighting over a banana - and it looked ridiculous. Suddenly, I felt a surge of indignation, and I shouted at them, "Hey! Do you want me to call the police?" One of them shouted back at me, "Yes! Go ahead and call the cops. Then I can tell them how this guy drove five feet behind my bumper all the way from (the city)!" More 'F' words from the other guy, and they were back at it, but somehow hesitating a little to start throwing punches. An older man from across the street began to walk slowly and cautiously toward the pair, and I decided to carry on to the church so I wouldn't be late for the kids who would be arriving soon. I yelled at the pair to 'for crying out loud grow up' and left. I don't think they heard me, and I didn't end up calling the police.

Maybe because I've been watching too many episodes of the BBC's Robin Hood with my girls - we've been saying to each other lately, "Where's Robin when you need him?" in certain situations - but I wished I'd had the time to go back to the scene and intervene. I knew one of the men by sight, knew who his wife and children are, too. I felt like asking him, "Is this the kind of example you want to give your family? Do you want them to hear you calling another man a 'faggot'? Do you want them to see you exercise your stupid pride, rather than just apologize to this man for riding his bumper so closely, which by law puts you in the wrong, and then leave in peace?" And I wanted to tell the other man to walk away, that fighting would get him nowhere. But, I had somewhere to be. I hope that older man was able to calm the pair down and talk some sense into them, especially because both of them were old enough to know better. I hope, above all, that he wasn't hurt. That none of them were.

The road rage scenario got me thinking on a number of levels. When we are in a car, we are in a safe bubble of anonymity in many ways, and the other person is just a stranger who, perhaps, drives more slowly than we'd like. We believe we have the right to treat that person solely as the operator of the vehicle, not as another human being, so we feel quite free to swear at them, hurl abuse if we see fit, and speed past with a honk and a raised middle finger at the first opportunity. I've seen it so many times; people who would behave somewhat politely to another stranger in person, behave like a complete ass just because they are in a vehicle. That has happened to me before, when I wasn't driving as quickly as the woman in the vehicle behind me would like, so she floored the gas at the first opportunity and screamed at me as she drove past.  She was still only a car ahead of me at the red light, seconds later, so what did her rage really get her?  I still remember her face as she stuck it out her window to scream at me, and I remember thinking that it takes an awful lot of energy to get that angry.

Why do some people need to scream at others when they are slightly inconvenienced? And why do some people, particularly men, feel that fighting with fists is the only way to make a point? Why do they not back down when they know they are in the wrong, and if they are on the receiving end of that wrong-doing, do they not just walk away? Tailgating is not exactly a cause for World War III. I am pretty sure Robin Hood wouldn't bother raising an arrow to another man just because he drove his horse-drawn cart too slowly in front of him. If that driver was endangering the lives of others by mowing them down in the road and stealing their hard-earned gold, however, that would be a different story, of course.

From what I have seen, most episodes of road rage are a lot of drama over something quite trivial - just people looking for a fight, really. Sometimes I think the world needs to go for a long hike followed by a collective yoga class, given a cup of soothing peppermint tea and be made to read a selection of enlightening books before it even thinks about getting behind the wheel.

The Photo of the gorillas is from thefabweb.com. The other is from BBC.com Have a good weekend, friends. Stay cool. 

And speaking of bananas, Stella has a great banana cake recipe over at her virtual cafe. 

Musing on Schooling

Sometimes I walk into a situation where someone is having a bad day and speaks before they have a chance to consider the impact of whatever is coming out of their mouth. One day not too long ago, I walked into a shop which I frequent. A mother and her daughter, who was dressed in pyjamas and a fluffy pink robe were purchasing some items at the till. I gave the little girl a knowing smile since my daughter had been similarly dressed that day for 'Pyjama Day' at the local elementary school. Every once in a while, the kids have a fun excuse to dress up in some kind of theme at school, and it had been entertaining to see so many kids and teachers similarly and ridiculously attired that morning.

When the pair had left the store and I was choosing my bunch of cilantro, I heard one of the women at the till ask the other why the girl had been in her pyjamas. The other woman suggested that perhaps the child was home schooled, therefore eliminating the need for proper clothing. The first woman practically shouted, (and remember, she works at this store) "If it were up to me I would BAN home schooling. They don't learn anything!"

I decided to tell the cashiers from my nearby position in the store that it was merely Pyjama Day at the local school. Moments later, the first cashier, looking angry, began to remove the packaging from a case of some product near to where I was choosing a can of black beans. I was this close to giving her a piece of my mind because I home schooled my children for four years. However I quelled my anger and restrained my strong desire to scold the cashier for being so narrow minded; I very rarely do give these people a piece of my mind - I usually go home and write about it instead.

Years ago, when we lived a forty five minute drive down a winding mountain road from any school, it did not make sense to drive my eldest to school for the two and a half hour daily Kindergarten class. The gas money required for the daily commute was deterrent enough and after a family friend suggested I home school, we decided to try it. For four years I taught my first three children and I still believe, to this day, that some of their later success in school could be attributed to the one-on-one they received in learning to read, to compute, to write, recite, and even to draw in their formative years. I also benefited from experiencing in an intimate way, their various styles of learning. Ian would understand a math concept before I had finished explaining it; Galen could memorize anything in record time and rarely forgot it even a month later. Emma I only had for Kindergarten, but she was never one to lag behind her brothers, and learned to read in Kindergarten from a handy book called Alphaphonics. Home schooling is certainly not for everyone, and it would not have been my first choice but for the simple logistical challenge of where we lived when our children were small; it ended up being the best of experiences for our family and brought my children and I much closer.

We made many friends in the town where we did our shopping, some of them home schooling families, some of them not. They all accepted us until one day when I said the children would be moving from the home into the one room school house at the lodge. By the end of my fourth year of teaching my children at home, there were enough school aged children at the lodge to qualify for a district funded teacher three days per week. My home schooling friends were not impressed that I would be handing my children over to the school system, but with a new baby at home, I was ready to move on, and I believe my children were, too. I explained that, while I valued the home schooling experience tremendously, my intention had always been for my children to progress to a school setting. I also knew in my heart that our days at the lodge were numbered, and the one room school option seemed like a great way to bridge the gap between home and wherever their next school would be. It was. My children had to learn to trust another adult with their education - Kim was an excellent teacher - and to accommodate and cooperate with other children in the class, even though they all knew each other like family.

When we moved here in March of 2003, and my children entered the local elementary school, I will admit there was a major adjustment period. Ian punched someone in the nose on his first day because the kid called him a 'motherf***er', and my son, not used to that sort of language in his schoolmates, took offense. (I did not hear about the incident for years, however. The very understanding principal let Ian off with a warning and did not call home.) Galen was completely overwhelmed with the behavior of the other children and begged me to keep him at home for the remainder of his grade three year (which I did most Friday afternoons), and Emma merely said, when asked how school was, "It's pretty much the same, Mommy, just louder." Over time, and with much coaching from their teachers and principal, and from us at home, the kids adjusted and even began to thrive. I will always say that while home schooling can give children an excellent academic education and an enriching family life, public school teaches them to get along with all sorts of characters, even the worst sorts, and find room to be generous to them while setting boundaries socially; both are important for the well-rounded education of the whole person, as long as the child is supported and feels safe in whatever school environment is chosen for them.

All in all, I think what I would like to have said to the cashier, is that the great thing about schooling these days is that there are so many options for learning which were not available when we were children. When I was home schooling my children my mother recalled how unhappy I had been in elementary school. "You would have been the perfect candidate for home schooling, Rebecca," she said. "But such a thing did not really exist back then and never entered my head as a possiblilty." Now, with choices, we can give our children the type of education that suits their style of learning and the life of our families.

Why Bullying?

Bullying. It has been in the news an awful lot as of late, due to the very publicly aired suicide of Amanda Todd of Coquitlam - a city an hour's drive from here. I am not going to re-tell her story. The information is easily found online. Suffice it to say, her story has brought the issue of bullying, both online and in person, to the forefront. A painful subject, bullying is an issue that sparks controversy as well as dialogue among experts and common folk alike. I've read several articles and heard several more interviews on the CBC on the subject over the past few weeks and thought I might as well throw in my two cents along with everyone else.  

Why do some people feel a need to bully others? A bully is 'one who hurts or browbeats those who are weaker,' so I suppose the action has something to do with a desire for power over others. But what makes someone desire power over another, particularly over someone perceived as being 'weaker' than themselves? Perhaps it comes down to an individual misconceived notion of one's worth being caught up in a sense of domination. If the meek are to inherit the earth, it sure seems like the strong hold it hostage an awful lot in the meantime.

My girls, who are still in the public school system, said that everyone at school has been talking about Amanda Todd's suicide. My elder daughter who is nearly sixteen is questioning the validity of her classmates' jumping on the 'Oh that's so SAD, that should NOT have happened. If she were in our school I would NEVER have treated her the way those mean kids did' bandwagon. My daughters reaction? "Oh really? You're sure about that? If this girl who used drugs, drank bleach, and made a misguided decision to expose her breasts to someone on line, leading to the photo going viral, went to our school, you would reach out to her? I don't think so." I added that my daughter and her friends would most likely have thought of her as 'messed up' and avoided getting close to her. It takes a pretty unusual teenager to assess another beyond appearances. Sadly, the truth is, it usually 'takes one to know one' in that sense.

By all accounts, Amanda Todd did not lack support, either at home or by the school system. Her mother said that right before Amanda's death she appeared to be doing better and had told her mother so.  My sense of things is that, for teenagers, their peer group often wins attention over any other source of opinion. Being called 'whore' and 'porn star' repeatedly by her classmates, after every attempt to change schools for a new start, obviously took its toll. What is wrong with people? Why do they have to be so mean to make themselves appear better than others? Where is the charity? Where is the basic human respect? Where is the kindness? I have heard it said often that we need to create a different climate in our schools, one of acceptance of others' differences, of tolerance, of generosity of spirit, and with this change in climate good will come. No doubt. But if that climate only exists in schools and not in the home or the work place or the world at large, how much headway for change can the school make? I leave these questions for the experts to ponder and quantify.

The CBC has a topical call in radio program called Cross Country Checkup. I wasn't planning to tune in that Sunday afternoon two weekends ago, but I was on my way to an arts council meeting and the radio was on in the car. The topic was bullying and suicide, and one caller got my attention before I had to turn the car off and go into my meeting. He suggested that the hero worship of athletes in high schools does its part in promoting bullying. Athletes tend to be revered by teachers and students alike in many cases, but this sort of admiration can often lead to the admirer overlooking other qualities that are less attractive. (I can remember a few of this sort from my own school days.) The caller went on to say that high school sports, and often the sports world at large, promote aggression, domination, competitiveness, and as we've recently seen in the world of cycling, extends to cheating and drug use. And while in other areas of life these qualities would be reprehensible, they are often accepted in sport, and those who question them are labeled 'whiners' and 'weaklings'.  Hm, I thought, as I turned off the car, he may have a point there. Later, I asked my two teenagers what they thought of the caller's idea. They both thought it had some merit. One of them said, "Well, you can be stupid, and a jerk, but if you're good at sports, they all love you. If you are stupid and a jerk and not good at sports, you get no respect at all." The other said, "I think there is something to that. A lot of behaviour gets overlooked if you are an athlete at school." When I asked my husband, who was an athlete in school, but somehow managed to stay aloof from the politics (I think that was in great part due to skipping a lot of classes to go skiing) he said, without hesitation, "Absolutely. Just look at football and hockey. Guys purposefully coached to 'take someone out', intentionally hurt them, take late hits, cheap shots, and often they get away with it. Why should they? Why are acts of intentional injury tolerated in sport?" Of course this got me thinking in an expanded way about the world we live in, and why bullying is such a problem at all levels.

Unfortunately, I didn't come up with any real answers or profound thoughts on the matter. I know that the world of sport, our schools, our workplaces (I recently heard a program on the quite serious problem of bullying among nurses in hospitals), and our society in general is struggling to deal with the issue and making some advancements. Our own elementary school here has a policy of celebrating each child's gifts and strengths, no matter what they are, and I applaud that policy. Still, the domination of the alpha males and females still carries so much weight in our world. Perhaps the reasons for that fact are more primitive than we would like to admit. I suppose it is up to each of us to look hard at ourselves, our children, our spousal relationships and cut off those bullying tendencies at the knees. Bullying takes many forms - it is a curious shape-shifting thing. It  can be as subtle as using persistent and manipulative language to bend the will of another toward our own agenda, and as outward as the big kid pushing the little kid off the swing in the playground. I remember my own mother saying in no uncertain terms to my big brother when his teasing went so far as to hurt or push me to desperation (I once spit on him from the upstairs balcony in retaliation), "Stop being a bully!"

Perhaps the best way to deal with the bullies in our midst is to keep talking about the subject,  to keep bringing it out into the open. I just hope it doesn't take the tragic death of another young girl to bring it up again.

Material Apathy

I was recently having a conversation with a couple of women I know. One of the women was soon going to be going on a vacation to a tropical destination - something I have never done. While I was making a polite comment about her upcoming trip she suddenly turned to me:

"Does everyone in your family embrace the whole 'Kootenay lifestyle'?"

I must have answered her question with a puzzled expression because she quickly added,


"You know, the 'not caring about material possessions' thing."

I was caught off guard. My instinct was to be insulted, because it seemed like an impertinent question at the time. But I, being me, quickly suppressed any response which might lead to conflict, and I replied, smiling, "Oh, you want to know if they are sort of hippy-ish like me.' I said that yes, we all had a little of the Kootenay way about us, laughing it off like what she said had not bothered me. We all parted soon after that and I rode my bike home across the sun-baked high school field, trying hard to make sense of what had just occurred.

I wondered what would make her ask me that question out of the blue. We had not been talking about anything to do with me and what I do not own; Had she been discussing the subject with other people who know me better than she does? The Kootenays, a beautiful region in the interior of British Columbia chock full of mountains, lakes and rivers, and the place where I had the very good fortune to grow up, do have a reputation for being a haven for alternative lifestyle types. Did I look to her like someone who didn't care about how I appeared? I thought about my outfit that day: cargo shorts, sky blue t-shirt, sandals, glasses, no make-up - which is not unusual for me, hair in need of a cut. As I looked down at my outfit I was reminded of the time when I was twelve and I asked my mother if she thought I looked like a boy, and she answered that I might help my case more if I dressed more like a girl. The fact is I had been riding my bike, doing chores at home and work on the computer. Did I need to wear something fancy for that? No, but I have been know to 'clean up nice.'

I wondered what the woman in question would think if she knew, despite appearances, how I love fine art, rich cashmere sweaters, old style Jaguars, Georgian architecture, Edwardian houses, micro-brewery ales, artisan breads and cheeses, Spode porcelain, Waterford Crystal, VQA wines, and the beautiful idea of going on a Viking River Cruise through Eastern Europe. To say I don't care about material things is an absolute fallacy. Besides owning only one cashmere sweater with an expertly patched elbow, and being able to indulge in the food and drink portion of my list from time to time, I don't actually own or intend to purchase many of those items on my list. However, it doesn't mean I can't admire them. Come to think of it, my husband and I are on the lookout for a china cabinet for the china and crystal we recently inherited, and highly value, from my grandparents.

In this part of the world, a lot of people own large recreational vehicles, power boats and big shiny trucks for hauling their trailers. I'm not interested in 'keeping up with the Joneses' in this regard. Apparently, 'a boat is a hole in the water you throw money into', as are gas-guzzling trucks and recreational vehicles, and we lack the necessary funds for that game. We are busy investing in our children. I was joking with an artist friend that maybe he could make us some life-size cutouts of a boat, trailer and a large truck, and we could trim them with lights and put them in the driveway so we could 'dress up' our house for Halloween.

To be honest, sometimes I wonder what is wrong with me. Why am I not willing to do what it takes to have the bigger material things I might desire? Am I just lazy? Do I lack the necessary 'get up and go'? It's a fair question, because I know some of the other women in my life wonder what it is I do all day. I've come a long way from that teenage girl who tacked up a large collage of high fashion photos from magazines on her wall and once considered a glamorous career in advertising or fashion design - I most definitely had material aspirations back then. How do other women who are also wives and mothers do it, because in this part of the world you need two incomes to support that kind of lifestyle. All I know is, whatever these other women have in the way of ambition, I lack. Maybe I'm just not willing to do what it takes to have all that stuff. I'm not willing to join in the vicious cycle of  'buy this car to drive to work, drive to work to pay for this car.' * What I really want to do is to be free to write, to think, to read, to cook, to walk and run, to sing, to work at things that interest me and make a difference, whether they pay or not, and to provide a calm and happy home life for my kids and my husband who works too much. Is that so wrong?

Here are The Police playing their song 'Spirits in a Material World.' While I was writing the draft for this post in the car while waiting for my son's violin lesson to be over, it came on the radio. Timely.

* lyrics from Canadian band Metric

The Writer's Ego

Yesterday, at our public library's annual book sale, an older acquaintance and I happened to meet at one of the many tables. "So I see you're on my Facebook," she said.

"Oh, well yes," I said, a little confused because it was she who had sent me a friend request.

She went on to say how the whole thing disgusted her, and how from her point of view, it was all a big ego trip, a way to say "Look at me, everyone, look at my pictures and see my great life." Although I know she was talking about the site in general, and could not deny at least some truth in her opinion, I began to feel sensitive about how much I share on the site.

I told her how I have a lot of family and friends spread half way across the country and Facebook is a great way to share photos and jokes and little things about our lives with each other. I also joked that I was fairly careful not to brag about my children too much, because I know that can be irritating to some people.

"Oh, I don't mean you," said my acquaintance. "I'm only joking." And she walked away fairly quickly.

As I continued my search for gems hiding somewhere between the pulp fiction and the self-help books, I tried to shake off the discomfort I was feeling as a result of the exchange with my acquaintance; perhaps she did mean me and didn't want to tell me point-blank to my face. Suddenly my Facebook life flashed before my eyes. Every photo, every quip, every opinion, every link to my two blogs I had shared over the past few weeks passed through my mind like the pages of a flip book.  I decided not to spend any more time (just then) worrying about what had just passed and concentrate on finding some books with my youngest daughter who had accompanied me to the sale.

The experience at the book sale brought to mind something a friend had said to me when we lived in the  Campbell River region of Vancouver Island. Campbell River had been home to a writer named Roderick Haig-Brown who had become nationally and internationally famous for his beautifully written books on fly-fishing, on nature and the adventure of living and working on the West Coast, and for his stories for young readers. Haig-Brown, while well respected by local environmentalists, outdoors people and literary types, was somewhat scoffed at by others in the region, my friend being one of them. "That guy?" she said, "He couldn't wait to die so everyone could hear the eulogy he wrote about himself." Poor Haig-Brown. I will admit that my friend is something of a philistine, but then, I didn't know the England born Haig-Brown personally, only visited his house which was a Provincial Heritage Property now run as a B&B by a live-in caretaker and read a few of his books - the ones not about fishing - so I was not in a position to argue. In addition to being a prolific published writer Haig-Brown was a magistrate in Campbell River and drove around in his sleek Jaguar. He died in 1976. As usual, I thought of something to say to my friend in reply much later. (They call that 'carriage wit', as in, you think of your witty retort in the carriage on the way home from the party.) I thought perhaps my friend did not understand the personality of a great writer like Haig-Brown, of their need to communicate their thoughts, to bounce them off, well, somebody; the great pleasure they take in something they have written to their satisfaction after mulling over it first in their minds until it has the right aura, and then getting that intangible glowing thing down on paper in words, glorious jumblings of letters on the page which culminate into something like art, if not art itself.

I knew my friend was mocking Haig-Brown for his ego because she had said as much, so I decided to look up the word. In my tattered copy of Webster's New World Dictionary the word 'ego' has three meanings. 1. the individual as aware of himself; the self  2. conceit  3. psychoanalysis the part of the psyche which governs action rationally. The first two meanings interested me the most because people generally think of ego as being conceit. When it comes to a writer, however, I tend to think most writers are individuals incredibly aware of themselves, and this, while doubly a blessing (because it enables them to be incredibly aware of others) and a curse (because all that awareness can be exhausting) for a writer, appears to others, especially those not terribly understanding of the artist's ways, as conceit and self-absorption and even exhibitionism.

I grew up with writers and learned to recognize the signs of productivity, and the signs of despondency in them. The constant juggling of the exterior and interior life of a writer makes for a rewarding but, at times, difficult path which is understood by few. This lack of understanding is both humbling and frustrating, and the writer must simply carry on doing what he must do. For his sanity, and for his art.

So, in the end and despite my annoying sensitivity to the opinions of others, I will carry on sharing my writing on Facebook, along with anything else I please. I have realized that it is communication and expression of ideas which make me tick - dare I call myself a writer - and if Facebook is one of the formats for that expression then so be it.